Bureau of Indian Standards Adopts Wi-SUN Alliance Wireless Communications Specification as incorporated in IEEE 2857, as the National Standard for India Smart Meter RF Communication Networks

The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), India’s national standards body, has officially adopted the Wi-SUN Alliance FAN (Field Area Networks) specification, as outlined in IEEE 2857-2021, as the national standard for Smart Meter RF Communication Networks in the country. This strategic move aims to foster interoperable, multi-service, and secure wireless communication networks across various sectors, while also streamlining health and performance insights for both software and hardware into a unified platform.

Driving Interoperable Wireless Solutions

The Wi-SUN Alliance FAN specification, backed by a global ecosystem of over 350 industry-leading companies, is instrumental in driving the adoption of interoperable wireless solutions for smart utilities and smart cities. Tailored to support large-scale outdoor networks, including smart metering projects, smart grids, street lighting, and other IoT applications, this specification ensures reliability and efficiency in its implementation.

India’s Focus on Renewable Energy

India’s commitment to achieving energy independence through renewable sources is reflected in successive budget allocations. For instance, the 2024-25 vote-on-account budget allocates substantial resources, including $9 billion towards providing 300 units of free electricity to 10 million households monthly through rooftop solarization. Additionally, $1.9 billion is earmarked for the development of 100 smart cities in the country. These initiatives underscore the importance of adopting smart grids, smart meters, and interoperable solutions to support India’s energy goals.

Phil Beecher, President and CEO of Wi-SUN Alliance highlights the significance of BIS’s adoption of the Wi-SUN Alliance FAN specification. He said, “The adoption of Wi-SUN Alliance wireless communications specification, incorporated in IEEE 2857, as a standard for India by the BIS is a clear signal that the National Standards Body recognises the role that wireless mesh technology will play in driving the growth of smart cities in India and the rapid rollout of smart meter projects over the next few years. This recognition is also a huge growth opportunity for member companies based in India, including Cisco, Renesas, Silicon Labs, Texas Instruments, Exegin, and CyanConnode, as well as those looking to expand into the Indian market.”

Ensuring Security and Reliability

Wi-SUN’s track record as a proven standard for smart metering networks, with millions of units deployed worldwide, ensures reliability. Security remains a top concern for utility companies in India, particularly those operating under a PPP model. Proprietary solutions pose security risks due to their limited transparency and dependency on vendors. In contrast, open-standard solutions like Wi-SUN FAN offer transparency, interoperability, and flexibility, mitigating the risk of single-point failures.

Key Features of Wi-SUN FAN

Wi-SUN FAN utilizes public-key infrastructure (PKI), with each device containing a unique identity certificate, enabling mutual authentication and preventing rogue devices from accessing the network. Its adoption of IPv6 facilitates the use of standard enterprise network security tools, allowing utilities to conduct intrusion detection, traffic shaping, network analysis, and penetration testing. This ensures better network visibility and mitigation of DOS attacks, making it a logical choice for long-term operations and maintenance.

Implementation in Smart City Living Lab

Wi-SUN’s wireless mesh technology is currently supporting the Smart City Living Lab project in Hyderabad, a collaboration between the International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT-H), the Telangana government, and the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology India. Serving as a testbed for smart city technologies, the Smart City Living Lab aims to drive economic growth and local development through IoT innovations.

Amarjeet Kumar, India Regional Coordinator at Wi-SUN Alliance said, “Smart meters are pivotal for India’s ambitious Smart City projects and it will help distribution companies manage the dynamic and disruptive changes occurring in the grids, especially with the infusion of solar energy, home automation systems, electric vehicles, and more. For any Smart City, smart metering is a prerequisite. Wi-SUN’s wireless communication standards are great for implementing such large-scale projects in the country as it provides the credibility of an open standard that is secure and interoperable,”

Reji Pillai, President of India Smart Grid Forum (ISGF), acknowledges Wi-SUN Alliance’s contribution to global standards and advocates for its mandatory adoption in smart metering and smart city applications in India – “[India Smart Grid Forum] ISGF has been closely associated with Wi-SUN Alliance for over a decade and we complement the ground breaking work done by Phill Beecher and his team at Wi-SUN over the years. Wi-SUN’s field area network (FAN) standard has emerged as the global standard which is adopted by IEEE as IEEE 2857 and by Bureau of Indian Standards as IS:18010(Part4/Sec1). This is a great achievement and in India we should ideally make it mandatory for all smart metering and smart city applications which will ensure interoperability between different systems and reduce total cost of ownership of all applications.”

Wi-SUN FAN Certification Labs in India

Wi-SUN Alliance has established Wi-SUN FAN PHY certification programs for the Indian frequency band (865-868MHz), with several member companies already certifying their products. TUV Rheinland Bangalore serves as a Wi-SUN-approved lab for certification, with plans underway to commence the certification program for Wi-SUN FAN specifications. This initiative aims to support IEEE 2857 and BIS standard IS 18010 (Part4/Sec1) compliance testing and verification.

Improving the operational efficiency, profitability and cost-effectiveness of power distribution companies in India calls for the rapid adoption of smart metering technology. While India has currently installed 8.6 million smart meters, it’s still in the nascent stage of rolling out this technology to all households in the country, providing immense growth potential for solutions offering interoperability.

Abhijit Grewal, Senior Marketing Director, of Smart Cities at Wi-SUN member company Silicon Labs underscores, “With India’s desire to roll out more than 250 million smart meters by 2025, there’s an urgent need to find a wireless communications standard that can scale, while meeting interoperability, reliability, and security requirements. The campus-wide Wi-SUN network already in place to control street lighting and connect nearby sensor nodes onto the network provides us with a unique opportunity to showcase Wi-SUN solutions in a real-world environment”.

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